Friday, 25 October 2013

On the first of January every year, me and the Him take the
jars of change that filled up in the year that just died and pour them into a
machine that changes them into a piece of paper that you can swap for real
money that you can then swap for a special, Well-Done-On-Being-Alive
present.It’s a tradition, or an old
charter or something.

We’re now six days on from the most recent sinking of Atlantis, which I’ve written about in
public as well as on this here blog, and five days on from the moment that I
realised I might have made a terrible mistake.Sure enough, tickets for the cinema screenings for The Day of the Doctor were duly announced as becoming available
from 0900 today.Two weeks before my
payday.Also, as I’ve mentioned before,
I don’t do purchases online, everything’s a cash transaction, face to
face.This means that I can’t take
advantage of online discounts, exclusive offers and all the stuff that you
young whippersnappers take for granted.I’m working on it.

I almost walk past a soulless car park
cinema on the way to work, so I thought I’d depress myself and ask how much milk
they’d be requiring me to squirt in exchange for tickets. Seeing as BBC (“licence-fee payers already
enjoyed the chance to watch the programmes in the late 60s”)1 Worldwide are involved, I knew that
it was going to be painful, I just wanted to find if there was any possibility
that I’d survive the procedure.

We’d been planning to go and see The Day of the Doctor with friends in a cinema in Cardiff for
months, but there was absolutely no way that could be done now, which is a
shame.I’d have liked to get us to the
London Convention in London’s London as well, but the tickets had sold out
instantly and there wasn’t a cash-in-hand option anyway.It should, by rights, be taking place in Cardiff but that’s a
conversation we’ll have another day.Back in the past, I’ve just entered the soulless car park cinema
for the first time.

There wasn’t a queue, which is a shocking indictment of
something, so I went straight up to the person guarding the information and
tried not to come across as a Doctor Who
fan.

Me:Hi.You’re showing The Day of the
Doctor, the Doctor Who fiftieth
anniversary special.

Information Guardian
1:Yes, yes we are.

Me:I just wondered if you could tell me-Oh.Hang on a minute.I’ve just
realised.It’s going to be a one-off
live showing isn’t it?

Information Guardian
1: Ummm.Yes, I think so.

Me:Are they more expensive than just your usual
3D prices then?I don’t need
glasses.Ha ha ha ha.No, really.I’ve got glasses at home.Quite a
few pairs.3D glasses that is.Are these live things usually more expensive
then?

Information Guardian
1:Yes, but that’s the top end.It’s not likely to be that much.

Me:Oh, I wouldn’t bet on it.Right.Great.Thanks.Bye.

Information Guardian
1:Next!

And so on.

I had a quick check online and found that the Australian
showings had already sold out.One chap
said he’d paid $180 for three tickets which, having seen both the Regeneration
and Fourth Doctor Time Capsule box-sets, I can well believe.Still, the prices weren’t definite so there
was still a chance.I could probably
manage £20 at a push but nothing more than that.

The next morning I decided to try again.I couldn’t find a list of opening times
anywhere on the soulless car park cinema’s website which was a bit
annoying – I was still hoping that maybe they’d have them available early or
something.It wouldn’t be the first time
Whoniversary related things were
prematurely issued by huge organisations would it, BBC America?

Information Guardian
2: Next!

Me:Ah, hello.I was in yesterday and I wondered if you could tell me how much the tickets
for the Doctor Who 3D live special on
the twenty-third of November are going to be, please?

Information Guardian
2’s keyboard:tappity taptap tap

Information Guardian
2:No.We don’t have it on our system yet.You’re the second person to ask today.I’ll just ring the manager.

Me:That’s lovely.Thanks.

While she’s off ringing the Manager, I’d better mention
something that happened on my way to the soulless car park cinema.After I got off the train I’d checked a
cashpoint and found that my balance had been kidnapped.Following a panicked visit to the bank
itself, I managed to piece together the events leading to this.A wandering direct debit that I’d forgotten
about had turned up unannounced in the small hours and been told to spack off
by my bank who then helped themselves to my The
Day of the Doctor ticket money as a reward.We’ve all been there.The whole
experience hadn’t done me any good, and I was only in the soulless car park
cinema because when I set myself on a course of action I stick to it.Hang on, she’s coming back.

Information Guardian
2: No, the Manager doesn’t know
either.

Me:Great.Okay, how much do you think the tickets’ll be?

Information Guardian
2:Well, live events are a bit more
expensive than standard showings.Shouldn’t be more than £21 though.

Me:£21.Bargain.It’s gone up since yesterday.Okay, thanks.Oh – what time do you open on Friday?

Information Guardian
2:10.

Me:10.Of
course.

Information Guardian
2:Well, 9:45 for 10.Thereabouts.It’s not likely to be £21 though.

Me:I wouldn’t bet on it.Okay.Thanks.Bye.

Information Guardian
2:Next!

I managed to get the problem of the wandering direct debit sorted out, replaced the money the bank had treated themselves to and,
after a lot of walking, got myself back to the exact place I’d been
in before the day had started.I tweeted
BBC (“licence-fee payers already enjoyed the chance to watch the programmes in
the late 60s”) Worldwide, the soulless car park cinema and Twitter in
general, asking if anyone had any idea how much the tickets would cost.No one replied.The general online consensus was that, come
0900 they’d be on the site buying up their tickets while they could – after
all, a single showing is a pretty limited number of seats.I’d gone to sleep before some lucky
individuals started announcing they’d managed to buy tickets because they were
already online.

I’m conscious that this is very much a First World Problem
by the way, don’t worry about that.I
totally understand the thinking behind it, and I don’t begrudge BBC
(“licence-fee payers already enjoyed the chance to watch the programmes in the
late 60s”) Worldwide their eye for a buck.The problem is that Doctor Who
means a lot to me and this is a special occasion.

Me and the Him were sat about ten feet away
from Nick Hurran when he announced he’d got the directing gig, there’s a nice
circularity to seeing the fruits of his labour with all the attendant experience
of an event shared by a roomful of people who care just as much as you do about what's on the screen.As cheesy at it sounds, I think it’s
important, if I didn’t we’d watch it on iPlayer.Trips to the cinema have become so
commonplace that sometimes it’s hard to remember if you’ve even seen a film,
although that might just be me.Whatever
else happens, this is going to be an important moment for a hell of a lot of people.In these days of time-shifting, torrents and
twenty-three million channels of nothing/sensorite2 those moments have become quite rare.I really wish I could have taken the Him to
Longleat.This is, for now, the nearest
I think we can get to that.Oop – that’s
the alarm.Time to get up.

It’s chucking it down and it’s dark.The website still says nothing about prices.It goes 0900 as I leave the house, my head's stuffed with images of online transactions and my internal Countdown Dalek is barking the number of remaining tickets
with every puddle-bothering step.I
catch the train, stalk up the hill that goes on forever and get to the soulless
car park cinema at 0944.There’s a
young man standing right in front of the doors but otherwise no queue.

0950.More people
join us.It’s really wet.I’m going to get a cold.Inside the staff are moving the queue posts around
and laughing.

0955.One person’s
banged on the windows.I’m soaked and
starting to stress.The staff are having
a great time.Every now and then one
will come up to the door and then walk off.

1007.It’s not listed
on the system.My first thought is that
it’s already sold out.

Information Guardian
3:Do you have an Unlimited card?

Me: No.

Information Guardian
3: Oh.It’s only coming up as
Unlimited.Can you go and stand over
there please?There’s a queue forming.

I get directed across to stand behind the young man from
earlier.I’m actually shaking with
nerves by now, which is ridiculous.

Information Guardian
4:Oh, the site’s updated.Here we go.

The lad in front of me buys five tickets.I hear the price, divide it by five and then
double that.Blimey, I might be able to
do this.Now, it’s my turn.

Information Guardian
4:Yes?

Me:How much for one and a half tickets for the Doctor Who fifti-

She tells me.It’s
more than I thought.Of course it is,
I’m not eligible for a discount.

I stand there for about a million years.I’m drenched.I’m shaking.I don’t know, I
don’t know, I don’t-

Me:Go on then.

On the first of January every year, me and the Him take the
jars of change that filled up in the year that just died and pour them into a
machine that changes them into a piece of paper that you can swap for real
money that you can then swap for a special, Well-Done-On-Being-Alive
present.It’s a tradition, or an old
charter or something.

The Him doesn’t know we’ve got tickets3 yet.

1. And for everyone panicking about the
bare-bones releases that The Enemy of the
World and The Web of Fear are
‘enjoying’ – of course there’ll be Second
Efforts further down the line. They
released Scream of the Shalka, didn’t
they?

2. We don’t do that joke anymore.

3. I do like the way the tickets are
personalised, I must say. Unfortunately
my name’s on the Him’s one and his is spelled totally wrong.

Sunday, 20 October 2013

The discovery of the authentic remains of prehistoric giants
has revived a very old riddle, which has always puzzled the learned.

- Bernard Heuvelmans, On the Track of Unknown Animals

Me: Well, the
trailer's more of a trailer than I thought it was going to be.It’s also mixture of car advert, a 2D version
of a 3D experience and the bullet-time opening credits to Watchmen and divisive
like you wouldn't imagine. Once again, Atlantis sinks beneath the waves
of a newly-melted internet.

I don't know. I probably liked it but I can't tell any
more. This is another reason to step away and do something else for a
bit.

We watched The Enemy of the World last night - actually
watched it. It's brilliant - as suspected - and I found it much more
exciting than the trailer.

The trailer
knows it's going to be pulled apart by wannabe-geneticists, hoping to piece
together The Day of the Doctor from stray DNA - that's how it's been designed. It’s an easter egg hunt. It's also a call-back of sorts to the first
Doctor Who 3D trailer, the one that ran before Alice in Wonderland. They both look
lovely because that's how they've been built - there's no point getting angry
with them: you might as well shout at the future.It won't care, it's happening anyway.

The Enemy of the World resembles nothing less than a living,
breathing, moving fossil. It’s the Loch Ness Monster for real1 – a
coelacanth; a sabre tooth tiger; a dodo.Likewise, The Web of Fear proves that Yeti exist.

So, we should admire the shiny promotional tool, but throw
our arms around the impossible. And cryptozoologist Phillip Morris
deserves a hug too.

The Him yawns.

Me: Seriously?I
thought that got quite moving at the end.

Him:zzzzzzzz

1. So it wasn’t the Borad all along.And I guess this means the Zygons will have
given up dairy too.

Saturday, 19 October 2013

Asked whether viewers might also see the recovered episodes,
without having to pay Apple £1.89 per episode or £9.99 to download the complete
stories, BBC Worldwide said licence-fee payers had already enjoyed a chance to
watch the programmes in the late 60s.2

Me:Nice.No, I reckon we should have a chat about a
few things to do with Doctor Who and
the blog.

Him:Like?

Me:Well, the
recovery of the missing episodes first off.

Him:The Feast of Steven?That
was a surprise.

Me:Ha!Especially as the BBC were destroying it as it was
being broadcast.

Him:You made that
joke when we were watching it.

Me:All those
thousands of years ago.Well, the thing
is that a few of these things have finally escaped the BBC Canteen.

Him:With the help of[content deleted at the advice of our lawyers].1

Me:I’m sure that’s
just something that crops up accidentally during the interviewwith Philip Morris in this month’s DWM.Of which, more in a bit.

Him:When?

Me: 'In a bit.'

Him:When’s that?

Me:Later.

Him:Are we there
yet?

Pause.

Me:Yeah.The whole interview’s really strange.It reads a lot like a blue-penciled, "Meet Denholm Reynholm" puff piece conducted for a Reynholm Industries internal
newsletter.I’d say that’s because it’s
been written in a white-hot rush to beat an inexorable deadline - but
it obviously hasn’t.The whole business was hinted at in
the small print of the last issue; the
Terror of the Zygons review features mentions the recoveries; the
restoration interviews make it quite clear this has been known about since
before June and the two cover designs can’t have been knocked up in a
lunchtime.And fair play to genuine hero-of-the-hour,
Philip Morris, for getting almost as many mentions throughout the issue as Mark
Gatiss does.

It’s worth pointing out
that Denholm Elliot played Marcus Brody in Raiders
of the Lost Ark.Which
[content deleted at the advice of our lawyers]1 with [content deleted at the
advice of our lawyers]1and then [content deleted at the advice of our
lawyers]1after [content deleted at the advice of our lawyers].1But I doubt any of that really happened.

Him:I have no idea
how to respond to that.

Me:I can totally
understand why BBC Worldwide are trying to milk the fans for as much as
possible during this, the year of their daughter’s wedding.

Him:But…What?

Me:It’s a Family Guy gag.

Him:It’s [content
deleted at the advice of our lawyers].1

Me:If you say
so.Anyway, I think it’s fair to say
that you don’t reach the final stages of ten year’s worth of DVD releases and
then totally change the design of the packaging for the final couple...2

Him:Are you going to
bring up the blog?

Me:Yeah, I’ll start
gnashing and frothing otherwise.

Him:Well then, you’d
better bring up the blog quick.

Me:Okay.We’ve had an odd year with the blog – some of
the entries have taken ages to put together and we sort of lost momentum
because of things that happened in the real world.

Him:Right.

Me:And then we were
about to really get back on track with The
Web of Fear – which is largely typed up – when the noises from the BBC
Canteen got too loud to ignore.3

Him:Right.And then?

Me:Well, we’ve
watched and made rough notes right the way up to The Space Pirates.Also,
I’ve done illos for almost all the rest of the Troughton stories and quite a
few of the Pertwee ones, so we’re ready to get going properly at a moment's notice.But…

Well, we’ve watched almost all of the recons – so we’ve turned out to be
some of the last stragglers up the traditional Ascent.Now though, it’s like there’s been a huge
landslide and a new route’s opened up.Personally,
I’m tempted to hang on and see whether it looks worth attempting when all the
clouds that’ve being kicked up by the Whoniversary have settled.Basically, what I’m saying is that I think we
should head back down to an earlier base camp and wait until the New Year to
resume climbing.

Me:Yeah.I’m sure it’ll be better than the [content
deleted at the advice of our lawyers]1 to
try and get people watching Atlantis
will turn out to be.5

Him:What do you
mean?

Me:The ‘trailer’
that isn’t a trailer.Unless it’s
designed to show how the last fifty years has all been leading up to [content
deleted at the advice of our lawyers].1Which I’m sure it will, seeing as The
Name of the Doctor and the recent [content deleted at the advice of our
lawyers]1 both seem to suggest that’s where we’re going.

Him:Do you think the
trailer will be all the Doctors to date crowning [content deleted at the advice
of our lawyers]1 as King?

Me:Ha! I don't know. I hope it's fantastic but I'm not expecting a miracle.

Him:Is that us?

Me:Unless I’ve gone
off on one in the footnotes, yeah.2Oh –
this doesn’t mean we won’t be doing stuff with the blog between now and New
Year.

So, our gap until the New Year is sort of to give time for any new releases to be announced, so I can work out which ones we’ll have to go
back and do again, and which ones we don’t.
That doesn’t mean that there won’t be posts in the interim though –
there’s a special present lined up for the Fiftieth that got lost in the
stampede last year. Yeah, we’ll still be
here.

I’m going to announce quietly that I’ve written some
articles for the Doctor Who Appreciation Society recently, so I’m hoping they'll be appearing in Celestial Toyroom over the next few
months. I’m also doing ‘research’ for a
thing that’s still nebulous but means I get to go library spelunking, which is
glorious fun.

4. Yeah, I’m excited,
but did you really think I wasn’t
going to wait until the Him was here before watching them? Part of the deal is that we watch them
together, which is why we still haven’t seen either The Ambassadors of Death or The
Space Pirates recons yet. Or the
escaped copies of [content deleted at the advice of our lawyers].1

5. As you can tell,
this was written after the announcement of the trailer for the trailer for the
announcement for the trailer, but before the trailer for the trailer for the
announcement of the trailer was shown.
Before Atlantis. Again.